You've probably heard that before and thought, 'yeah right'. Well, we're not going to lie to you, it's not that you'll suddenly feel like you're wearing super night-vision-goggles by eating just one carrot but carrots do contain vitamin A. And vitamin A is good for your eyes - so, eating carrots keeps your eyes healthy and you are able to see better in the dark!
That's the thing about food, it's there to help your body to operate at its best, not just taste good. So, it is important to get a good balance of foods - to make sure that you feel good, everything works just right and you can do whatever you want to do, superhero stylee.
Your body is pretty clever
It takes the food that you give it and does 3 basic things with it:
- It uses it to grow and make you stronger
- It uses it to repair any damage that's been caused
- It stores some of it away to use later, in between meals
Want to keep your superpowers in tip top shape? Well then, follow these simple rules:
- Eat some fruit or vegetables with every meal - the reason for this is that fruit and vegetables are our main sources of vitamins and minerals, which keep our senses sharp and prevent us from getting ill. Choose stuff you like.
- Have fruit with breakfast, e.g. chopped up apple in your porridge, banana after your boiled egg and toast or grapes in your yoghurt.
- Have veggies with lunch, e.g. lettuce and tomato in your sandwich, mushrooms and carrots in your spaghetti or beans on your toast. Fruit for dessert is good too - plums, nectarines and peaches are delicious and sweet.
- Have 3 or 4 different vegetables with dinner. Maybe peas, green beans and sweetcorn with your fish fingers? Or sweet potato mash, red cabbage and courgettes with your chicken? The more colours on your plate the better!
- Make sure you eat foods containing 'protein' (which is a type of food, pronounced pro-teen) every day -you need it to grow and get stronger.
- Foods that have 'protein' in them, include: fish (oily fish such as salmon, tuna, mackerel, sardines and swordfish are especially good and you should try to eat these 3 times a week), chicken, beef, ham, turkey, nuts, seeds, yoghurt, eggs, cheese and beans.
- Eat foods containing 'carbohydrates' (which is a type of food, pronounced car-bo-high-drayte) before and after exercise - this helps give you energy and repair any damage you've done.
- 'Carbohydrates' foods, include: a jam sandwich, a banana, a cereal bar, a flapjack or honey on oatcakes.
- Drink plenty of water. If you don't get enough water, your body stops working and you can get ill. So, it's important to try to drink at least 4 glasses a day. If you don't like the taste, you can add a splash of squash.
It's also important to make sure you exercise to stay healthy. It doesn't matter what you choose to do - it could be football, rugby, running, walking, cycling, rowing, karate and many other sports - it's just a good idea to get some exercise every week.
Sam's favourite food was crisps. He ate crisps for every meal. His mother tried to buy him lots of other things to eat but Sam was stubborn and he just didn't want to try anything else because he knew he liked crisps, so why couldn't he just eat those? And exercise, pah, that was for people who weren't very good at X-box, not him.
After a little while, Sam started to notice some odd things happening to him. Firstly, his tummy started to hurt and stick out. He felt like he needed to fart all the time and he couldn't poo. Then he started to notice that his muscles were shrinking. One day he woke up and looked in the mirror and noticed that he was slouching over and was tired like an old man.
He went to see the doctor, who said the reason Sam's tummy hurt and he couldn't poo was because there wasn't enough fibre (chunky bits in food like fruit and vegetables) in crisps to get food moving through his gut, so it was all stuck in there. Apparently crisps had no protein or vitamins and minerals and because of this his muscles weren't getting fed either. He'd have to try some other foods if he wanted to look and feel like a 10 year old, grow back some muscles and get to poo again!
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Greg's thing was chocolate. He just loved it. He knew he wasn't supposed to eat it all the time and his mum used to tell him off for eating it but he couldn't help it. He used to hide chocolates under his bed, in his shoes, on top of the bookshelf - wherever he could. Just so he'd have some when a craving hit. He loved how he felt so full of energy when he ate chocolate and off he'd go racing around.
Often he'd end up teasing his sister and that would always end up with her crying and screaming at him. Or he would go and play football with his friends and they'd end up being red-faced and shouty because Greg would get angry for no reason at them all the time. When his friends pointed this out, Greg would just stomp his feet, punch walls and stuff and then storm off. On the way home, he'd feel so tired and walk all slumped over.
Soon, Greg's friends didn't really want to play with him because they were sick of him always arguing or being too tired. Greg also noticed that his marks at school were getting lower and he just couldn't concentrate in class. Finally be saw big dark rings under his eyes and then a big spot appeared on his nose. That was the last straw.
He cried his eyes out. So much so that snot ran down his face. Greg should've read our tips - too much chocolate isn't good.
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Martin was a very tall lad and he liked meat. A lot. He'd heard his dad say that meat was the food of champions and he wanted to be a champion boxer, so he ate meat every meal. He'd ask his mum for extra portions of meat and he'd pretty much ignore the vegetables on his plate.
Then he started being teased at school for having really stinky breath. In the beginning, people just thought he'd forgotten to brush his teeth. The thing was, Martin was brushing his teeth but the stinky breath wouldn't go away.
Eventually, he was desperate, so he looked up 'causes of bad breath' on the internet. And do you know what he found out? Eating lots of meat and no vegetables means the food doesn't move through your gut and it can start to rot in there. And the rotting makes your breath smell. Martin just needed to eat vegetables.
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